The Vinton-Shellsburg men’s swim team kicked off its home schedule with a win over visiting Waterloo East Thursday night at the Iowa Braille School pool. The young Vikings squad celebrated senior night with a wire to wire 57-34 victory.

The Vikes started fast taking first and second in the Medley Relay. The A relay team of freshman Noah Armell, sophomores Anthony Dickerson and John Eden and senior Captain Marshall Mullenix took first with a time of 1:38.65. The same relay team also took first in the 320 Free Relay to cap off the evening.

In addition to anchoring the two relay wins, Marshall Mullenix turned in a first place finish in the 60 Freestyle. Other individual event winners were John Eden in the 100 Butterfly, Anthony Dickerson in the 160 Individual Medley, junior Matt Lash in the 100 Backstroke and senior exchange student Lasse Hedinger in the 100 Breaststroke.

More important than the individual placing was the tremendous amount of improvement made across the board. Of the team’s 16 swimmers 10 are new to the team this season, with a combined eight years of high school swim experience among the group. But the progress that these young men have made in the past two months has been amazing. This year’s squad, while short on experience, is filled with guys who are excited to swim and compete and will continue to make significant improvement. Significant time drops Thursday night included senior Ricky Jeray dropping 9 seconds and senior Cole Miller improving by 5 seconds in the 100 Freestyle. Returning junior Garrett Wilson shaved more than 10 seconds off his previous best 100 Free time.

Tuesday was also a night for the some young swimmers to make their mark. In addition to freshman Noah Armell's win in to 100 Freestyle, fellow freshmen Josh Rake captured second in the 100 Breaststroke and Jonah Blix and Shay Dulin were 4th and 5th in the 60 Freestyle. Sophomores CJ Fowler and Kyle Schemmel also scored team points with second place in the Individual Medley and a third in the 100 Backstroke.